Does Google differentiate between a site with spammy link building practices from a victim of a negative SEO attack?

[Syed_Raza]

I've be tasked with figuring out how to recover our rankings as we are likely being hurt by an algorithmic penalty.  I have no idea if this was the workings of a previously hired SEO or the result of negative SEO, **how does Google differentiate between a site with bad/spammy link building practices from a victim of a negative SEO attack? **

[dotfly]

In general Google doesn`t differentiate between them - if you get the chance or better take the chance to get in a dialog or direct contact with Google (f.ex. using the reconsideration request) they can get this information. But I doubt that they care about that. Unfortunately you have to do the same work in both cases: clean up the mess.

Its imaginable that your chances to recover are much better if youve been a victim than an ex-black hat (website)

[Syed_Raza]

Thanks for the replay Marc, that clears up my confusion.

I had chance to ask John Mueller (from Google) what to do about spammy backlinks and he automatically assumed I was up to no good.  I've never bought a crappy link in my life.  Previously hired SEOs and/or unscrupulous competition were likely the culprits.  We can take accountability for ignorantly hiring shady link builders but apologizing for being a victim of negative SEO is flat out ludicrous.